Using An Advanced Search To Find Idea Records

A regular keyword search (image below), uses a single set of keywords (the entire group of keywords you type in, including any spaces) and searches every field in a record to find where those keywords exist inside that record.

You can only search one set of keywords at a time. In the image above, the keyword phrase 'monday,' would be the value that's searched for in every searched record's fields.

Advanced searches, let you choose which fields will be searched, and let you define a set of simple, or complicated, instructions for how those fields should be searched. Advanced searches also let you search for multiple sets of keywords at a time.

In this advanced search the Creation Date field will be searched to see if it contains a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday value. This search is using 3 separate keyword phrases, each on its own line, instead of just the single search phrase a regular search can perform.

Regular And Advanced Searches Only Search Whatever Records Are Being Displayed In The Window

Regular and Advanced searches always perform their search on the set of records currently displaying in the window.

This an important point to remember, especially when you want to search all the records that the window could display, but you don't realize that the window is currently displaying the last search's set of matching records. In this case, you're probably going to get incorrect results.

An Example Search, That Involves 3 Record Fields

So, you might want to start your searches by first clicking on the Reset hyperlink in the Search Panel first. This forces the window to display all the records it would display, when it was opened. Then perform your regular or advanced search.

An Example Search, That Involves 3 Record Fields

Let's say that you wanted to search for all the Idea Records, created on a Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, whose development has lasted longer than 80 hours, and are linked to at least 10 computer files.

You'd start the search by clicking on the Advanced Search hyperlink in the Search Panel.

That would display an Advanced Search Settings dialog box, like the one shown below. Then you'd use that dialog box to configure how you wanted a set of fields to be searched.

Here's How You'd Configure Each Field's Search Settings

You'd click the name of a field in Panel 1 to select it.

Then you'd go to Panel 2 and enter each keyword phrase (group of keywords) you wanted to find in that field. If you're searching multiple phrases, press the Enter key to put each of them on their own line.

Enter the keyword phrases to be searched for.

Now you'd go to Panel 3 and use its components to describe how you wanted those keywords compared to each record's field values.

Select how the keyword phrases should be compared to the field values.

Finally, you'd go to Panel 4 and click on the appropriate "Match Method" radio button to tell the search how many of the keywords it must find in a searched field.

Then, if you're searching more than one field, you'd repeat steps 1 to 4, for each new field you wanted configured.

Select how many keyword phrases have to be found in a record.

The next 3 images show you how a single Advanced Search Settings dialog box is used to configure each field that needs to be searched, to perform the search described above.

Creation Date Field:

Search configuration for the Start Time field.

Hours Field:

Total Data Files Field:

How To Run The Search

After you've configured all the field's you're going to search, then click the dialog box's Search hyperlink.

The image shows that the search is being done on 248 Idea records.

All the Search Settings for the Advanced Search have been defined. Now just click the
Search hyperlink to run the search.

The dialog box closes, and a split second later, all your matching records are displayed in the Ideas Index Window.

To open any of these records in the Ideas Window (their "editing" window), so you could read and/or edit them, all you'd have to do is double click anywhere on its record entry in the list.

The image shows the first record entry's Idea record being displayed in an Ideas Window, after I double clicked on that record entry.

The Note belonging to a double clicked record entry is displayed in the Notes Window.

How To Review And Modify Field Search Settings

Every time you click a new field in Panel 1, the Advanced Search Settings dialog box, stores the name of the field you're configuring, and all the search settings in panels 2 to 4. Then it adds the named collection to the Review Search Settings combo box (image below).

If you click the down arrow on that combo box, you can select a field name, and the dialog box will redisplay all of that field's settings so you can review and/or change them, before you click the Search hyperlink. Once the Search hyperlink is clicked, those settings are gone forever.